The present invention generally relates to automated component mounting apparatus capable of sequentially picking up and placing components on a printed circuit board, and, more particularly, to a feeder for continuously feeding electrical contacts, one at a time, for use by such automated component mounting apparatus.
Pick-and-place machines are well-known and are increasingly used to automate and increase the speed at which electric and/or electronic components are surface mounted on printed circuit boards. Such machinery has also been used for automatically surface mounting miniature electronic component parts, commonly known as integrated circuit (IC) chips. One example of such a component mounting apparatus is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,473,247 in which the components intended to be mounted are generally flat integrated circuit chips which can be readily engaged by suitably shaped and dimensioned suction nozzles. Other examples of electronic component pick-and-place machines are described in Document No. TI-572-1-0391 published by Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. for its "Panasert" series of machines. However, the components which have heretofore been handled by pick-and-place machinery are generally individually packaged on continuous carriers. While this approach has been satisfactory for integrated circuit chips, resistors, capacitors and the like, the approach does not work well for electrical contacts or connectors which tend to have high profiles and come in a wide variety of irregular shapes requiring very accurate placement at a pick up station in order for the suction nozzle to properly engage and be able to pick-up and place the component.
More specifically, the feeder of the present invention is intended to feed electrical contacts or connectors of the type disclosed in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/554,342, of which has been assigned to the assignee of the present application. In the aforementioned application, a prior art effort to feed electrical contact pins to a pick-and-place machine is discussed. However, because such pins are carried in individual pockets or compartments of a continuous tape this increases the cost of such pins. Additionally, and more importantly, because the pins are free to move in such pockets or compartments, the individual contacts are difficult to precisely align at the pick-up station. Unless the contact pins are properly aligned in relation to the vacuum nozzle, damage can be done both to the pins as well as to the pick-up nozzle.
Pick-and-place machines are typically provided with a plurality of feeders, each for feeding a different electrical component or part. The feeders for such machines are almost never interchangeable. The different manufacturers of the pick-and-place machines generally design the feeders only for their specific machines. This makes it difficult, if not impossible, to use the feeders from one machine on another machine. To that extent, users of such machinery have frequently been dependent on the feeders supplied by the manufacturer of their specific pick-and-place machine--this decreasing the versatility of such machines. This has, in some instances, limited the range of components that a user can apply to printed circuit boards on particular pick-and-place machine.